


Empty Breath, Wasted Potential.

by solarpillar (solarwind)



Category: Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-25 14:22:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7536226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solarwind/pseuds/solarpillar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For between the farmer and the shepherd, nothing is ever wasted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Empty Breath, Wasted Potential.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [o0whitelily0o](https://archiveofourown.org/users/o0whitelily0o/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Empty breath, wasted potential.](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/214381) by o0whitelily0o. 



> Just porting the fic from tumblr to here. A fic to whitelily's fanart.

Winter in Japan is cold.

You remember the lands you have been, lands where winter was equated to prosperity and summer with the bleeding of lambs, the falling of hoe on the flatness of earth, the sweating of your brother.

The soil was not very good for farming. It was filled with clay and salt, but it was a piece of land alright, and he worked hard to make food grow, food fit for humans.

And you, you walked to the pastures with your sheep, let them breed, killed them for meat. There were no wolves or thieves back then, so empty was the land.

And here, people live and bleed like lambs all around you. Livestock. You don’t need to tend for them, for you had not become a shepherd of mankind. 

It was a wasted potential, the angels said.

Your brother is your cousin, and he is broken, his soul tainted and stirring slowly, mournfully. He is, without a doubt, a human.

You don’t want him to be livestock. You know what it is to be one, to live with blind faith until slaughter.

This is blind faith too, you remember with irony.

You are already wasted, you want better for him.

You were a shepherd, never a farmer, but you think you can do this.

If you can’t make the seed grow, cultivate it like a farmer does, you can lead it like a shepherd, to a pasture where it will root and sprout.

If he is to hold the knife, then you will walk gladly to the slaughter, your throat a gift, your blood the oil to anoint the new king. You flesh shall give pleasure to him, as lambs had. Your bones shall be his throne and crown.

For between the farmer and the shepherd, nothing is ever wasted.


End file.
